


Electric

by OmegaZeta5



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/M, Felix Hugo Fraldarius is Bad at Feelings, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, Fluff, Pre-Timeskip | Academy Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-14 10:34:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29044689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OmegaZeta5/pseuds/OmegaZeta5
Summary: He doesn’t know when he crossed the distance, there before and here now, hand braced on the railing against the wind and his arm around a tiny waist, flush to him. They stand crushed against the railing and he grits his teeth until the winds subside, draining with the roar in his ears. The day cool and still once more. Burning breaths through his nose, gooseflesh all over him. Her breathing small, shaky pants. Hands twisting his vest and she shivers looking up at him, wide-eyed and lips half-parted.“I take it Wind’s a no, then,” Annette whispers.
Relationships: Annette Fantine Dominic/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 14
Kudos: 44





	Electric

**Author's Note:**

> I managed to successfully rope a friend into playing 3H and one of the first things we did when she finished was gush over this pairing  
> At her behest I churned this little thing out, hope you enjoy!

Felix could be saying it wrong. He has to be. There’s no other explanation for it. No. Magic’s supposed to be more complex than that. He sits there with the frown digging into his face, his palm out and gleaming against the afternoon sun on the swaying grass of the courtyard. He concentrates on his hand and the Reason rune burns above it, circling and swirling. 

“ _ Fotia, _ ” he says. Nothing. 

“Maybe you said it wrong.”

His tutor watching him, intent as ever. Bright-eyed and bushy like she always is in their class, on the field. But they’re neither here nor there. They’re in the courtyard on a Sunday afternoon and they’ve been here for the better part of a day and he still hasn’t cast anything. They only started trying to cast something in the latter half. That’s still half an afternoon he could’ve spent on the training grounds with the sword in his grip and the dummies ready to be flayed. Instead he’s here. Maybe he really was saying it wrong. 

“How could I be saying it wrong?” 

Annette flinches a little, like she always does these days. He could ask her about the weather and it’d be enough to send her scurrying, but she doesn’t do that here. She keeps looking at him and it’s like she really, really wants to yell at him and run. When she speaks her voice is normal. 

“Well, like mine.” She clears her throat and raises her hand, that same Reason rune. “I could say  _ A _ **_n_ ** _ emos _ , and…” She waits for nothing, and nothing happens. “See? Buuut, if I say…”

She turns her voice a near whisper. “ _ An _ **_e_ ** _ mos. _ ”

A small gust of wind twirls through her fingers before it fades into faint wisps, then nothing again. She flicks her hand away. 

“Like there was even a difference,” Felix says. 

Annette raises a finger. “Ah, but there  _ was _ a difference you could hear in the first place. Pronunciation can really make or break these things.” 

Felix sighs. “How am I supposed to say it, then.” 

She picks up one of the many textbooks strewn about between them and picks the dog-eared page marking their section. Her face lights up. “There we go! Emphasis on the  _ i _ .” 

“Fine.” He lifts his textbook in one hand, running over the equation for this spell. He raises his other hand away from them and stares, long and hard. 

“ _ Fot _ **_i_ ** _ a _ -” A faint burst of orange flickers in his palm and he blinks and almost misses Annette’s small yelp. They’re snuffed almost instantly and leave nothing but a faint tingling through his fingertips. 

“Alright!” Annette flips through her notebook, eyes darting. “Now, that could mean one of thirty-seven different things. Your blood-type mixed poorly with the spell, that’s a possibility. Or the spell’s energy resonated with the left side of your brain instead of your right. Actually, if that happened your lungs would be outside of you. It could also mean the spell never reached your mind at all but was actually drawn to a different part of your body, a kidney, a muscle, ohh geeze, a pancreas-induced spell would actually make a lot of-” 

Felix tosses his book back on the pile and Annette clamps up. Maybe she’ll run now. Maybe she’ll yell at him about damaging Monastery property or about proper listening etiquette or even about things he wasn’t supposed to hear but did anyway. She loves to yell about that, much as it mystifies him. Almost as much as these damn incantations do.

“Or it could just mean Fire’s off the table,” she says apologetically. 

“Hmph. Like any of it should be on the table to begin with.” He casts a frosted glare over the courtyard of sunkissed breezes. “What the hell was that woman thinking, putting me through this?”

Annette leans far in her seat to get a better look at him, her feet dangling. “Your academic progress, maybe…?” 

“A gigantic waste of time.” 

She frowns. “Magic’s a waste of time, huh?” 

Felix huffs beneath his breath. “For me. What use is there learning Reason when I’ll fall back on my swordplay more than half the time out there on the field, anyway? You don’t see her trying to pawn off axeplay on you, do you?” 

Annette laughs, bubbly. “Actually, funny you should say that-” 

“It’s a bust anyway,” Felix says, sighing. “You saw it, it was nothing. Thank the Goddess we put it to bed quickly.”

Annette squirms a little, like she’s thinking. “No we haven’t.” 

“I have.” 

“Okay, I haven’t.” She sorts her books into a pile between them. “Fire’s just one spell line. We’ve got a whole host of black magic strains to run through, and we’re gonna hit every single one.” 

Felix eyes her. The most confidence she’s shown him in weeks. But it’s confidence over  _ this _ . “Are we, now.” 

She nods enthusiastically, eyes brimming with determination. “Look at me. Do you know how long it took me to settle on Wind?” 

Felix rolls his jaw. He breathes in to answer. 

“Ages!” Annette pushes his books onto his lap and he grunts and she keeps going. “It takes even longer for some people, poor things. But you see what I mean? Just because we didn’t land yours on the first try doesn’t mean we have to pack it all up already.” 

Where the hell is this coming from? Felix lifts his books as they both get off the bench. He has to dip his chin a little to match her gaze. “You’re sure you want to keep going?” 

She nods so wildly he thinks her ringlets might come loose. “Mhmm!” 

“I’m not an easy student. You remember Ashe with the bows, right?” 

Annette rolls her eyes but she stays beaming at him. "Good, I hate easy.” 

He grimaces. Something loose in his knees. Strange. “Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.” 

“That’s the spirit!” She tilts her head as she steps away to leave. “Trust me, we’ll get your Reason certification in no time.”

He watches her hop away into the setting sun. He blinks his gaze away. Something feels off. Must’ve taken more out of him than he thought, this session. Whatever. 

* * *

They've always joined forces against him and they've always denied doing so. Ever since they were kids playing with wooden sticks in the Palace court. Nothing’s changed, except they’ve swapped the sticks for blunted iron and they’ve traded the court for the training grounds, bright blue sky above as they wail away and Felix has to catch both their strikes with one blade. Always a team, these two. 

His sword clatters against the stone and he steps back, breathing. Sylvain and Ingrid rest the butts of their lances on the floor, breathing and sweating just the same.

“How many’s that make?” Sylvain asks.

“Twenty-four,” Ingrid says. 

“Nice.” 

Felix glares at him. “Don’t you have a mistake she should be killing you over?” 

“Not one she would know about.” Sylvain catches Ingrid’s gaze. “None at all, that is.” 

Felix scoffs in his stomp over to pick up the sword. Sylvain wipes the sweat from his brow. “Gotta give him credit—all these years later, he’s still trying.” 

“Shut it,” Ingrid says. She looks at Felix. “Are we going again?” 

Felix scowls, rubbing the sword down. “No. I have a session in a half-hour.” 

Ingrid’s face brightens. “Oh, that’s right! How are your Reason studies going?” 

He doesn’t answer right away. “Fine.”

Sylvain elbows Ingrid. “That tone. Music to my ears.” 

“Sylvain,” Ingrid says but even she holds a certain gleam in her gaze now. 

Felix looks at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

“Means you hit a snag.” 

“I haven’t.” 

“Right, you’re ‘fine.’ I getcha.” 

“Make another crack, why don’t you. Make my day.” 

“Thought you had a session in a half-hour.” 

“I can cancel.” 

Sylvain laughs. “Oh man. With Annette? Good luck.”

“Make my day.” 

“Enough,” Ingrid says, “both of you. Goddess.” She looks at Felix. “Go on, we’ll pick this up another time.” 

Felix grumbles but nods his response. He moves to return his sword to the racks and rolls his eyes as Sylvain follows.

“Tell you the truth,” Sylvain says, his voice low, “I kinda already knew you’d hit a snag. Annette told me.” 

Felix’s gaze runs cold. “Did she.” 

“Only because I pried it out of her,” Sylvain says. “I gotta hand it to that girl—she’s one tough cookie. It’s like my game doesn’t exist anymore.” 

“Has-” 

“She hasn’t, and neither have I.” 

“Then?” 

Sylvain’s smile turns more genuine. “Good luck, I really mean it. Reason, Faith...it can all be a real head-scratcher, sometimes.” 

Felix frowns. That strange sensation, the end of their last session. “Sometimes.” 

* * *

Annette groans. “He really told you?” 

“It’s Sylvain.” 

Felix sits beside her on the steps overlooking the Monastery pond. A few students mingling across the space, a lone fisher on the dock. Annette bites her quill.

“I really didn’t tell anyone else, though. I’m super-confidential about my tutoring.” 

He looks at her but can’t detect even a hint of a lie. “Fair enough.” 

She glares over the water, steaming. “Him, calling magic a head-scratcher? Come on. He could probably teach us both Reason with his hands tied behind his back.” 

Felix scoffs but his glare’s fading. “We’d have to offer up a girl as tribute.” 

Annette looks at him, smirking. “Just any old girl would do, eh? I know a few who’d be more than interested.” 

“I wouldn’t want to subject anyone to Sylvain.” 

Annette laughs, a pleasant and full sound. “Yeah, that’s a hellscape all on its own I guess.” She looks at him, then to his textbook. “Ready to try again?” 

Felix’s gaze falls on the words and his scowl returns. “Might as well.” He raises his hand and his glare deepens with the emerging rune circle. 

“ _ Pagos _ .” 

He flicks his hand again, the symbol glowing faintly. Annette watches keenly. 

“ _ Pagos _ .” 

“Anything?” 

“...My fingers are a little tingly.” 

Annette winces. “This is a bust, isn’t it?” 

“You think.” 

Annette drops her quill, shaking her head. “But it’s such an obvious fit. Kingdom, cold? Ice should be the perfect spell line.” 

“You were just telling me earlier how none of this magic nonsense is perfect.” 

Annette laughs in a sheepish sort of way, melodic tones. Felix squints again. The jelly in his knees. A faint dizziness in his head, like fried eggs. 

“Well it’s a growing field, for sure,” Annette says. “And that bodes perfectly for you; means you’re far from breaking the surface. We just gotta scratch this one off the list.” 

“Sure,” Felix says but his scowl stays. He shuffles his notes, crinkled pages of scribbled lines. They crumple in his hands. “All that practice. The memorization, the equations and the theories. A tingle in my fingers.” 

Annette arches a brow at him. “Thinking of calling it quits?” 

He looks at her. “Wouldn’t you? If the task was so baneful.” 

“I always wanna learn. You couldn’t catch me quitting anything.” She freezes. “That’s a context-sensitive answer.” 

Felix shakes his head, glaring at the notes. “All that wasted time.” 

Her gaze turns sympathetic. “It really sucks, huh? Putting in so much work and then the thing doesn’t even work out.” 

He frowns at her. “Everything you put work into works out.” 

Annette’s smile falters. She turns her attention back to the notes. “You blaze through it all so fast, though! Honestly, we’re getting through these spell lines in half the time any other non-adept would. Except, you know. Sylvain.” She pouts. “Whatever. Point being, we can’t stop now. Not until you get the hang of this.” 

Felix looks her over. This bubbly girl, small and peppy and looking so imploringly at him. Unflinching in her determination. She blinks. 

“What is it?” She wipes her cheeks. “Is it gone?” 

“You’re stupid to try so hard, here. I might not know a lot about magic, but I know most people would call this pointless. Two Reason lines down, nothing.” 

“Okay, I guess I’m not most people.” She looks down for a moment like her own statement confuses her. She looks back up. “And it’s not pointless. It’s a waste of time when you flub out of a spell line but it isn’t, you know? It’s all experience, it’s all useful.” 

Felix’s frown won’t go away. “It’s a waste of your time, if nothing else.” 

“It’s not!” 

Felix sighs exasperatedly beneath his breath. “Don’t be an idiot. I’m sure if you begged the professor hard enough she’d assign me a different tutor. Hell, maybe she’d see how pointless the whole thing is herself. All I need is the blade.”

Annette looks at him until her brow furrows, her biting her lip. Tiny hands balled into fists. “Oh, I see.” 

Felix bristles. “Hey, don’t blame me, blame her.” 

“Nice try. Get me to leave and suddenly you’ve got no payment. How are you supposed to forget if I don’t do you favors like this?” 

“...Forget?” 

Annette makes a grumbling noise, squirming. Then she shuts her eyes. “Deep breaths, Annette. Deep breaths.” 

“What's happening.” 

Annette glares at him. “No more tricks. The second you cast your first spell is the second I’m free, got it?” She sighs. “I can finally stop looking over my shoulder, day in, day out, second-guessing all my friends. Do they know, don’t they know?” She shivers. “Gah, it’s the worst.” 

Felix stares at her for an eternity and then he finally remembers. “Oh. The thing in the greenhou-” 

“Shh!” 

She waves wildly in front of him like just saying the location will reveal it all to the whole Monastery. Felix leans away, blinking. “Alright, alright.” 

Annette sighs in relief, backing off. “Thank the Goddess. That was a close one. Woah. Do you hear that? Oh. It’s my heart. Whew.” 

The high-running energy from their spat, tingling. Felix smiles and it flickers away as fast as it came. Legs like rubber, even with him sitting down. And there’s a more distinct feeling in the dizziness, now. Like it creeps down his spine, into his chest. He groans frustrated beneath his breath. 

“Felix?” Annette blinks her wide eyes at him. “Everything okay?” 

The question brings him back to reality. He shakes himself loose. “Nothing. It’s nothing.”

* * *

The source of his torment patrols their classroom. A quiet command in her steps and an alertness in her gaze, all-seeing, all-knowing. If she catches Felix’s glare, she doesn’t show it. 

“The trebuchet as a siege weapon was outmoded in Adrestia as early as 776. It remains a mainstay of Kingdom artillery all the same.” Byleth eyes the class. “Can anyone tell me why that is?” 

Too many students raise their hands, as always, and most of them get the answer wrong, as always. Felix rests his chin on his hand, his eyes fogged as Byleth shoots his classmates down, one by one. Such a simple question and the Kingdom’s best and brightest still can’t seem to get it. She’d get it. She’d have to. Why isn’t she raising her hand? His gaze drifts lazy over the class and there’s a frantic, low movement out the corner of his eye. 

Oh. She is raising her hand. Felix blinks as Annette quits waving, beaming another one of her smiles at him. She gives him a small thumbs up with both hands. Another session after class today. The way her eyes sparkle; maybe this’ll be the one. Fried eggs. Maybe he’ll finally go mad. 

“Felix. You’re always so attentive.” Byleth looms over him, an owl’s gaze. “Care to share the answer with the rest of the class?” 

Felix squints miserably. Her faint smirk. She knows he knows. The question was really his to answer this entire time. And she waited all this time, knowing he’d never raise his hand. Felix sighs.

“Because we suck at magic.” 

Snickers across the class. Byleth looks up and her smirk loosens to a smile. “Correct. Magic has never been Faerghus’s forte—your lots always gotten by through sterner stuff. Armor, axes.” She casts a sidelong glance at Felix. “Blades. If there’s one thing I’ve gathered in my time as your instructor here, though...it’s never too late to learn.” 

She paces away and the lecture goes on. Felix huffs beneath his breath. Never too late to learn. Idiotic. His gaze rolls away and it’s only then he notices. 

Annette’s eyes still firmly locked on him. Her helpless smile, the slight tilt of her head. He rolls his eyes once and her attention returns to the lecture and he frowns as she does. Then he shakes his head, and it’s gone. 

* * *

Felix shades his eyes from the pale sun for a moment. A cool afternoon with next to no breeze on the roof of the armory tower. Annette paces back and forth by the stone railing and her tone is jittery. 

“Imagine if this is the one?” 

“It won’t be.” 

“Okay but imagine.” Her eyes sparkle. “It’s a really underrated spell line, you know. I’m the only one around I know who knows it. Except Linhardt, I guess, but Linhardt’s boring and he can’t know it like I do because he’s Linhardt. Everyone goes for Fire or Ice, they link the easiest with our nervous systems after all, but even then it’s like they think anything else is totally lame. That’s pretty lame. Don’t you think that’s lame?” 

“Sure.” 

The eager gleam in her eyes, like a winter hare. She claps her book shut with a deep, anticipatory breath and stops to face him. “Alright. Ready?” 

Felix hesitates. “Maybe I ought to stand a little further back.” 

“Sure, sure! If ya want. We really should be safe, though—open space, and all.” 

Felix takes a few steps back and clears his throat. Raised hand, burning rune.

“Remember, it’s-” 

“Right, right.” Felix sighs. “ _ An _ **_e_ ** _ mos _ .” 

They wait. Annette’s smile flickers. They wait more. Annette groans. “Man, this su-” 

A violent tug in Felix’s gut and the winds fly from his palm, silver and sharp and twisting an eternal whirlwind. There’s a roar in his ears and he forces his hand down with a grunt and it’s all he can to clench his fingers shut. The tug snaps and something in him pops and then his ears pop and he doubles over with a harsh breath. The residual winds coil and twist outward in a deafening blow. He looks up just in time to see Annette off her balance, waving her arms. The tower’s railing right behind her, her tipping back on one foot ever so slightly with her expression wild and frantic.

“Ohgoshohgoshohgosh-” 

He doesn’t know when he crossed the distance, there before and here now, hand braced on the railing against the wind and his arm around a tiny waist, flush to him. They stand crushed against the railing and he grits his teeth until the winds subside, draining with the roar in his ears. The day cool and still once more. Burning breaths through his nose, gooseflesh all over him. Her breathing small, shaky pants. Hands twisting his vest and she shivers looking up at him, wide-eyed and lips half-parted. 

“I take it Wind’s a no, then,” Annette whispers. 

Felix checks one last time to make sure the danger’s really gone and he steps away slowly, the stone beneath his feet suddenly strange in its solidity. “Yeah. That’s a no.” 

A small giggle bubbling in her throat and her hands clap over her mouth, eyes still wide. Then her shoulders loosen and the laughter doubles her over, relieved and happy to be here and not way down there.

“It’s not funny,” Felix says. He fights the curling of his lips with his arms crossed.

“No, no, it’s not, just-” Annette gasps, her hands pressed together in front of her smile. “ _ Woah _ , you know?” She laughs and it’s like she’s trying so hard not to. Felix ducks his head, tapping his foot and her giggle fit dies eventually. 

“Sorry,” he mutters. “That was bad.” 

Her hands fall and she stares at him, still gasping a little as she shakes her head. “Nu-uh. It was bad but it was my bad.” 

“I’m the one who cast the spell.” 

“I’m the one who told you to cast it.” 

“I almost killed you.” 

“...I won’t tell if you won’t tell?” 

He scoffs and she hops closer to him, a pleading smile. “Come on, don’t be like that! I would’ve been fine! We’re not... _ that _ high up…” 

Felix looks at her. Annette wilts a little. “Okay I would’ve been a pancake. But I’m not, see? I’m perfectly fine!” 

She claps her cheeks like it proves her point. Felix rubs the back of his head and looks away again. This damned wobbliness. He’ll have to sit down at this point. His head. This unending current. 

“So what happened, then,” he says. 

Annette seems to think. “Okay, this one’s super rare. But I’ve heard of cases where the incantation, or the energy infused into it, responds adversely to the mage’s physiology.” 

He looks at her again, shrugging. 

“You forced it. Your body did, rather. So, ah...Wind’s a  _ definite _ no, in that case.” 

“Why am I not surprised.”

“Are you kidding me? That one was all surprise.” Annette looks at him, beaming. “You’re really fast, you know that?” 

“I have to be.” 

She laughs again. Softer, her chin dipped and her fingers at her lips, like she’s trying to hide something. “I guess you do, huh. Sorry.” 

“Quit trying to apologize and just take mine. Fodlan’s sake.” 

Annette looks at him and her smile fills out once more. “I’ll try.” 

His frown deepens. It’s in his core again. He gives himself a rough shake, the tingling numbness incessant in his knees. 

“Hey,” Annette says, tilting her head, “what’s wrong?” 

“Nothing, it’s just—this damn current.” 

She stares at him. “Current?” 

Felix waves her away. “Electric. In my head, my knees. Everywhere. It’ll pass.” 

“Does it hurt?” 

Felix shakes his head. “It’s just...distracting. Everything else gives out and I’m liable to stop thinking. You’re a mage, you get it all the time.” 

Annette frowns, her brow knit up. “No, I don’t. I’ve never heard of that.” 

Silence. He scowls. “I’ll be fine. Whatever it is, it’s not staying forever. I’ll make sure of that.” 

Annette taps her foot, biting her lip. “Are you sure?” 

“I’m always sure.” 

“But what if this is the thing messing with your incantations? Like some weird mental block, the first of its kind.” She looks at him. “You’ve gotta see Manuela about this.” 

“Oh, please. It’s nothing.” 

Annette shakes her head, glaring at him. “Oh no. You don’t get to be ‘you’ here—this could be serious!” 

“I’ll deal with it.” 

“Nu-uh.” She tugs at his sleeves, peering up into him. “You have to see someone about this, I mean it. Promise me.” 

Felix scoffs incredulously. “Right, like you can-” 

“Promise.” 

The genuine concern in her tone, her face. Felix swallows. “Fine—fine! Get off me already, Goddess above.” 

She smiles and her glare vanishes and she frees him. “Great!”

Felix groans but it’s not as vicious as it should be. “Good grief…” 

* * *

He does this too often. Him sitting next to Felix with his head lowered beneath his hand. Felix drinks his coffee and Sylvain mutters low. 

“She pass us yet?” 

“Stupid.” 

“Sure. She pass us yet?” 

“Not yet.” 

The wave of students bump and brush each other through the dining hall, morning warmth filtering through the windows. A village maiden shoves past them, eyes red and blotched and a handkerchief in her hand.

“Ten ‘o clock.” 

Sylvain dips his head lower. The maiden jerks her gaze this and that way before disappearing into the light. 

“She passed us.” 

Sylvain relaxes with his sigh. “Thanks.” 

“What is that, the third one this week?” 

Sylvain looks at him. 

“Fourth?” 

He smiles. “You’re a great friend, Felix. Anyone ever tell you that?” 

“Idiot.” 

“Terrific friend, just amazing.” 

Felix drains his mug. “I have to go. Say hi to Ingrid for me.” 

“Ah yes, another day, another tutoring session. How’s Annette?” 

“She’s your classmate same as mine. Ask her yourself.” 

“Yeah, but, how is she?” 

“Imbecile.” 

“Alright, alright,” Sylvain says, grinning. “How’re the sessions going, then?” 

Felix slams the mug a little too hard. “Fine.” 

“Yeah, there it is.” 

“They are.” 

“Felix,” Sylvain says, wagging his finger, “come on. You give yourself up so easy.” 

Felix stares irritably at him. He sighs bitterly. “One crapshoot after another. Far’s Annette goes, she up and had me talk to Manuela about the whole thing.” 

Sylvain leans in, brow raised. “No shit.” 

Felix huffs his concern away. “Short and thick of it, Annette thinks there could be something in my makeup, my blood. Something that makes my mind respond to magic differently, whatever that means. Something to make learning Reason even more of a fruitless endeavor than it already is.” 

Sylvain sits back, clicking his tongue. “That’s a bad hand if I’ve ever heard one. How certain is all that?” 

“You think I know?” Felix shakes his head. “Byleth’s supposed to call me in about it, one of these days.” 

“Sounds serious.” 

“It isn’t. Annette’s just jumpy.” 

“I bet she is.” 

Felix looks and Sylvain raises his hands. “I surrender. How’s it feel, exactly?” 

Felix sighs and repeats the explanation. The current, the knees. By the time he’s done he’s irritable all over again. Sylvain sits with a raised brow, nodding slowly and he doesn’t answer right away. “Interesting.” 

Felix snorts through his nose. “Torture, is what it is. Like a swarm of gnats in your head, incessant.” 

“Yeah, it’s, uh.” Sylvain seems to regard him strangely. Like he found something he never thought he’d get to see. “It’s something, alright.” 

“...What?” 

“Felix, tell me. When exactly do these detestable gnats swarm?” 

He frowns. “Aren’t you listening? Any time I try to cast a spell. It’s almost a delayed reaction, as if that wasn’t enough. I hardly notice until I’m talking to Annette.” 

Sylvain looks at him. Felix scowls. “The last thing I need is your sympathy.” 

“You know? You’re completely right,” Sylvain says, getting up, “you don’t need my sympathy.” He claps Felix once on the shoulder and his grin returns, broader than ever. “But you’re getting it anyway.” 

Felix looks incredulously as he starts to leave. “What the hell are you going on about?” 

Sylvain waves him bye without looking back. “Good luck, Felix. Good luck.” 

* * *

The sun sets before he finds her. Felix walks into the dim library and passes a group of snickering students on their way out. The candles all but doused, the tables nearly empty as they enter the early hours of the morning. Nearly. 

“You cross the six and divide the two...square root of the…” 

“Annette.” 

She keeps mumbling where she sits, doubled over and her head resting on the table with the piles of sheets and documents and scrolls and tomes. Felix nudges her slightly and her eyes stay shut. He hesitates. He nudges the slightest bit firmer and she snorts awake. She doesn’t seem to see him until she does and she lifts herself up a little, yawning. 

“Felix,” she says. Sing-song, dreamlike tone. 

“You missed a session.” 

Some of the fog leaves her eyes. She blinks. “I missed a session.” 

Felix looks around himself. “First I figured you’d blown me off. Smart. Freed me up for sparring. Then Mercedes was asking me where you were, so I went digging. That was three or so hours ago.” He huffs to himself. “Of course you’d be here. I don’t know how I didn’t-” 

“Felix,” she says, trying to raise herself further, “I missed a session.”

He blinks. “It’s fine.” 

“Noooo-” she says and it draws out into another yawn and her body lists to the side and he just barely catches her. Light hands on her shoulders, him hunched to match her level. The bags under her eyes. Felix scowls. 

“M’bad,” she says. 

“Hell happened to you?” 

She laughs lazily. “I dunno. I took these...herbs. They’re supposed to keep me-” she points straight up, popping her lips. 

That’s when Felix finally notices the small woolen bag amidst the pile. He swipes it, sniffing the opening with a frown. Fodlan’s sake. “These are sleeping herbs.”

“No way.”

Felix shakes the bag. Empty. He tosses it into the darkness. “The entire damn bag. You realize how unsafe that is?” 

She groans. “I was just...see, I thought I remembered seeing an old—tome. From when I was at the Academy and I thought, maybe.” She stares bleary-eyed at him for a while, sagging in his grip. “You know?”

“...What?” 

Annette seems to try and wriggle the wooziness away. Her voice remains as thick as before. “Maybe theres was something there. To help you. But there wasn’t.” She pouts. “Stupid book. So I checked out another, and another, aaaand…”

She gestures lazily over at nothing. Felix looks at all of the textbooks laid out before her, some yellowed and cracked, others leathered and dove-white. Pages upon pages of fresh and haphazard notes strewn through everything. 

“You spent our whole Sunday here,” he says, “didn’t you.” 

“Mm-hmm,” she says, nodding with her eyes pleasantly shut. Felix shakes her a little but all it does is open her eyes and there’s a new tinge there, one he’s never seen before: grief. 

“I’m sorry.” 

He squints. “For?” 

She blows air past her lips. “I didn’t find nothing. I thought I could...but I guess I couldn’t. I can’t do anything right, huh?” 

Felix looks at her and the dust from all this ancient parchment must be choking the air or something. The tightness in his chest, like it’s shriveling.

“Felix?” 

“Head back to your dorm. I’ll clean up here.” 

She shakes her head and musters up enough energy to wriggle free from his grip. Slow movements, molasses. “No, I gotta. There’s another. Book. Here. Somewhere…” 

The air rasps through Felix’s throat. “You cleared out the whole place, there’s nothing left.” 

“You don’t know that. Silly.” 

“Annette.” 

She looks at him a little clearer. “I’m your tutor, y’know. I’m supposed to help you.” 

“Get some sleep.” 

Annette blinks and her gaze turns desperate. 

“I gotta keep going. I gotta work this out.” 

“Don’t be daft. You’ll wear yourself down to nothing, and then you won’t work anything out. What kind of sense is that?” 

She stares anxiously at him. The most alert she’s been here, with him. “But I haven’t helped you yet.” 

He sighs. “You have helped me, Annette.” 

Her eyes darting. “Honest?” 

“Honest.” 

She stares, blinking. “I like your hair.” 

Her eyes shut and she slumps over the table. Light snoring. Felix stares at her for some time. His chest so tight. He stands up and breathes as deep as he can, looking around himself. Then he looks at her again, rubbing his neck and grimacing.

“Annette.” 

Nothing. 

“Ah, hell…” 

It’s awkward at first, maneuvering around the chair. She stirs for a moment when he lifts her, a discontented grumble in her throat as he scoops her into his arms. She’s lighter than his own sword, she has to be. Her chin dips to her chest and she settles again as he makes for the entrance.

“Where we going?” 

“Your dorm. Easy now.” 

“Mmkay.” 

* * *

“Tea?” 

“No.” 

“Pastry?” 

“Just get this over with,” Felix says. 

Byleth nods where she sits across him in her office. She stirs her cup and her gaze flits once to the folder laid out on the desk between them. “The results. I read them over.” 

“And?” 

She takes a single sip, like she always does. Taps the spoon against the ceramic brim, clockwork. “There’s nothing wrong with you.” 

Felix bristles. “What?” 

Byleth puts the cup down. “Vitals are stable, blood pressure steady. Fraldarius Crest and all, you’re a completely healthy Fodlaner.” 

Felix stares at her. 

“I’m sure you’re ecstatic.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” he says. “I’ve tried Goddess knows how many spell lines, none of them click the way they’re supposed to. You expect me to accept that?” 

Byleth shrugs simply. “Perhaps you just haven’t landed on the right one.” 

“Perhaps?” 

“Give it time.” 

“Time,” Felix says. He rolls his jaw and glares at the empty air, steaming. Byleth looks at him imploringly. 

“Time is all there is. For you, me. It flows differently for some, yet it flows nonetheless. In the end, it’s the only thing anyone can really count on.”

Felix crosses his arms, his jaw clenched. He turns his glare on her. “That feeling, then.”

“What feeling?” 

Felix taps the side of his head. “My brain fries, my knees give out. Every single tutoring session it grows and grows and I can’t escape it! If there’s nothing wrong then what the hell do you call that?” 

The air hangs. 

“Oh, that.” Byleth sits like nothing happened. A strange gleam in her eye that wasn’t there before. “I haven’t the faintest idea.” 

Felix scowls. “You and everyone else.” 

“Time, Felix. Give it time.”

* * *

The Knight’s Hall is perfectly empty this evening and he has the lone straw dummy right in his sights and still she won’t stop staring at him. “What is it this time?” 

“Oh—sorry.” Annette’s silhouette glows against the flickering flames of the fireplace. He can barely see her biting her lip. “I’m still thinking about it, is all.”

“Well, stop thinking about it. Focus up.” 

“I’m sorry you had to see me like that.” 

“Take the right herbs next time. Goddess.”

Annette shifts anxiously where she stands. “So that whole journey up to my dorm. I really didn’t. Not even once-?” 

“No.” 

“Whew. That’s a relief.” 

“You did hum a bit, though.” 

“Ssh!” The soft glow obscuring her features. He can’t tell if her cheeks really flush or not. “It’s bad enough you had to carry me. Now I have a whole buttload of things to bribe you over!” 

“You’re pretty light.” 

“S-so?” 

“Are we doing this, or what?” 

“Right!” She clears her throat, tapping nervous fingers on her notebook. She seems to look at him a bit more pointedly and all the anxiety fades away. “This is the last spell line.” 

Like he needs reminding. She keeps looking at him and the straw dummy suddenly seems rather compelling where it stands in the dirt pit. “Yeah, it is,” he says quietly. All the studying, the research. And the last thing he’ll ever give that smug professor of theirs is anything resembling failure. It’s all or nothing now, whether he likes it or not, and whether he liked it or not in the first place was entirely irrelevant. Because they’d been shacked up with each other either way and she stuck by him, failure after failure. All those screw-ups. It hadn’t felt terrible, having her bear witness to every single one. It...it would have felt wrong if she wasn’t, somehow. Hm. 

“Hey.” 

Felix looks at her again. Her gaze suddenly fierce, her chin held high. “You’ve got this. I believe in you.”

“Fine,” he says, swallowing the thickness away. Should’ve drunk some water, before starting. Too late now. He shakes his foot loose, cracks his neck and he concentrates, palm outstretched. A spinning circle of runes, taunting him, goading him. He runs his tongue across the roof of his mouth and breathes the space in. 

“ _ Vronti. _ ” 

For a single, solitary second, absolutely nothing happens. The flames flicker. Annette stands utterly frozen. The thudding thump in his chest. His eyes shift an inch.

The rolling in his gut, coiling and brimming and racing through his veins and a sharp crack blows out his eardrums and-

A lone lightning bolt, emerald green, crackling and striking right through the dummy in a flash. Felix blinks the spots away, his hand hanging dumbly in the air as he stares. The straw in smoking cinders. It...it happened. It worked—it  _ works _ . 

A faint ringing in his ears. Felix sways where he stands and his blinks turn sluggish. He breathes, turning. “It-” 

The air sucks out of him as she leaps, her arms flung over his shoulders and squeezing same as her legs. His hands have nowhere to go but around her and for a moment everything seems realer than it can possibly be, every speck of dust and pop of red-hot coals and it’s there. His knees, his head. His chest. Brimming sparks frying him from the inside out and he staggers back.

“Annette-” 

“I knew it,” she whispers, her chin digging into the crook of his neck and her cheek against his jaw and she seems to squeeze even tighter before finally hopping down, hands lingering tightly on his arms as she smiles up into him. “I knew it, I knew you could do it!” 

His throat’s dry. Everything is hot and cold all at once. “You knew I could do it.” 

“Gah, how could I be so  _ stupid? _ ” Her hands bunch into fists pounding at her head as she squirms. “Fire? Ice?  _ Wind? _ That’s not you, none of that’s you! It was always-” 

“Electric,” he says numbly. He’s sweating now, he can feel it. Holy shit. He’s dying.

She looks at him strangely for a moment and then her smile returns. “Thunder.” 

“Yeah, yeah, it’s...Goddess be damned.” 

Annette blinks. “Uh-oh.” 

The world growing hazier by the second. Felix opens his mouth to say something. Everything blurs into shapes and the last thing he registers before it all fades to black is the distinct taste of dirt. 

* * *

Lilting words, carefree tune. Something cool and damp on his forehead. A strangeness in his hair, the threads shifting ever so slightly. His eyes open near slits and the world’s foggy and on its side, a roaring fireplace. A dull throbbing in his head. A figure looming over him and the words go on and on, muttering and nonsensical. Something about girls and boys in the green muck where beasties lie sneaking-?

It’s the goddess-damned swamp beastie song. 

The world’s clearer than it has any right to be as he stirs and Annette jumps back with a yelp and the song ends. He winces groggily as he tries to sit up. The shapes twist and turn and he falls back with a grunt. 

“Well well,” Annette says, “look who’s finally up and at it?”

“Sit.”

“I wouldn’t try doing that for another hour at least,” she says. “That’s the normal turnaround...I think. I dunno, I was up after ten minutes when I cast my first-” 

“Hour?” His tongue’s numb. 

She inches closer where she kneels, nodding. “Yep! Ugh, I should’ve thought about it—most people aren’t prepared for the strain a successful incantation puts on them. It’s a  _ ton _ of energy expulsion for the uninitiated, it’s like-” 

Something shifts in his stomach and for one awful moment he tastes the bile running up his throat. He swallows, his eyes fluttering. Annette smiles sheepishly. 

“Yeah, like that. But it’s like a muscle, you know? It’ll get easier with time and practice, trust me.” 

“Time’s all therre iss,” he mutters. 

“You know, I never thought of it like that,” Annette says, tapping her chin. “I guess it is, huh?” 

“Water.” 

She shakes her head. “Mercie already gave you a ton of that. Guess you don’t remember, you were pretty loony. Still loony. She’ll be back, though! She went to make you some tea.” Annette groans. “I could really go for some of that, actually…” 

The damp cloth on his head. Nothing’s running the way it’s supposed to, up there. The letters seem to trip and fall from his lips like a dribbling stew. “Annette,” he manages. 

She perks up immediately. “Mhmm?” 

He lies and waits for the lurching to subside. “We did it.” 

“I knew you could.” 

He groans. “ _ We _ did it.”

Annette doesn’t answer right away. “Yeah,” she says softly, “we really did.” 

Felix runs his tongue past his lips, sighing. The world’s fading away already. “Late. Go.” 

Annette scoffs. “Right, and leave you here like this? Let’s get you back to your dorm, first—after the tea, of course.” 

Tea. “She know?” 

“It’s Mercie, she knows what you like.” 

He grunts. She’s back where she was when he woke up. Dabbing his head with the cloth, peering down at him with that ever-curious gaze. “Heard you,” he mutters. 

Her brow scrunches up. “Who what now?” 

“Song.” 

Annette frowns. “You’re supposed to have forgotten that.” 

“Y’just...did it.” 

“Okay, yeah, but—ugh.” She shakes her head, like she gives up. “Nevermind. You probably won’t remember after tonight anyway.” Her gaze leaves him for a little. “Sorry you had to suffer through that.” 

With each drawn-out blink, he fights to stay awake. It’s all going away. “Keep going.” 

She stiffens. “U-uh-”

The throbbing pounds a little harder and he grimaces. Her face just a bit clearer, then, the concern in her frown, the anxiety in her eyes. She dabs him with the cloth again and he settles and she seems to regard him in a different sort of way. Her eyes glittering as her smile grows.

“Alright, alright. Just this once, though.” 

That carefree tune wafts into his ears again and it’s all swamp beasties and cleaning and creepity creeping, the words incoherent but ringing a certain clarity, like they always do. A realness only she ever seems able to hit. His eyes shut for longer and longer as he blinks until he doesn’t blink at all. 

A cool strangeness brushing playfully through his hair.

* * *

Felix edges closer in his stance, taut and ready, his sword raised. “Come at me already.” 

That same pincer-strike, both rushing in from the sides. He parries Sylvain’s thrust and Ingrid’s still coming, lance poised and ready. 

“ _ Vronti. _ ” 

She falls on her backside with a grunt and soon enough Sylvain follows suit, his lance useless beside him. Felix stands erect, flourishing the blade as he looks down at both of them. “That makes twenty-seven. Again?” 

Ingrid huffs, thrusting the butt of her lance against the ground as she gets up. “Again.” 

“Goddess above,” Sylvain says, rolling his shoulder as he assumes his original position, “my compliments to the chef.” 

“The sessions paid off.” 

He grins. “They did, did they?”

“Get your ass back on the mark.”

Later, when they’re putting their weapons away, Sylvain’s by his side again. “One thing I’m dying to know.”

“Class starts in five minutes.” 

“One thing.” 

He’ll never be free. “Go ahead.” 

“You ever find out what that feeling was all about? That current, or whatever?” 

Those weeks since their last session. The thinking, the wondering. He could very well be wrong. He has to be wrong.

“It doesn’t matter anyway.” 

Sylvain looks at him and Felix matches the gaze, defiantly cold. Sylvain shrugs. “Yeah, it really doesn’t.” 

They make their way across the grounds in complete silence to meet up with Ingrid again. 

“...It makes you wonder, though-” 

“Shut it.” 

* * *

“I think the results speak for themselves,” Byleth says, eying the both of them. “Or am I wrong?” 

“Nope!” Annette shakes her head, her eyes wide. “Not at all.” 

“Not at all,” Felix says. 

Byleth nods, satisfied. She flicks her hand. “Very well. Consider this arrangement dissolved. Good work, you two.”

She drifts back into their classroom. Over and done with, just like that. Felix scowls. What he’d give to know what that woman’s thinking, sometimes. He turns and Annette’s standing there, tapping her foot absently with her gaze away from him. The sun setting into a late afternoon coolness across the courtyard. Their bench is right over there. Where it all started. Someone should be speaking right now.

“So I-” 

“I wanted to-” 

They stop in their tracks. Annette smiles her concession, tapping her fingers. Felix rubs the back of his head. “Thanks. For helping out, I mean.” 

“No problem! It was really...yep! No problem at all,” she says, a half-hearted laugh. “You gave me some great stuff to work with, to be fair—you deserve most of the credit.” 

He looks at her. “You do!” she says. “All I did was show you the numbers and things.” 

“I would’ve quit on our first session.” 

She waves him away. “What? Noo…” 

He directs his glare somewhere else. “I would have given up and you kept going. It was never a waste of time for you. None of it was.” 

“It never is, remember?” 

Felix hesitates, looking back at her. Of course she’s beaming at him. She always has. So cheery and radiant, the easiest smile in the world. Of course he goes weak at the knees and of course his head goes all fuzzy and of course his heart seems to squeeze so tight he thinks the next breath will never come and of course he never had to cast a single spell, utter a single incantation. He knows that. He knew that all along, of course he did, and if anyone wants to say otherwise, they know damn well where they can shove it and if they don’t he’s more than happy to show them himself. No. There’s no one to say otherwise because there’s nothing otherwise to say. Of course he knew. There was nothing to know. Is this going to happen every time? Nothing’s happening, here. She’s just smiling, you daft idiot. Goddess, it’s never going to go away. 

“Felix?” 

He blinks. “What?” 

She regards him strangely but her smile doesn’t leave. “I was just saying—you know, the occasion and all. I thought it’d be, I dunno, fun, if we…” she keeps on tapping her fingers. “You know?” 

He stares at her. She squirms a little. “Youwannahavedinnertogetheritsmytreatitsokayifyoudont.” 

“...Dinner?” 

She nods, fidgeting with one of her ringlets. “There’s this spot Mercie and I go to, in town. It’s a quiet little restaurant, I-” she clears her throat, “I think you’d like it.” 

He’s not particularly hungry. “I’m starving.” 

Some of the anxiety seems to fade away, in her. “Their coffee’s so-so but the cake.  _ Ugh, _ ” her hands tight to her chest, like she can already see it in front of her, “it’s to die for.”

He never cared much for pastries. “I could go for some cake.” 

Her eyes sparkle. “I really could too.” She bites her lip for a moment, bouncing on the balls of her heels. “I was thinking, maybe...now?”

There is nowhere else he’d rather be. “Give me a second. I forgot something.” 

“Sure! Sure, no problem.” 

He opens and shuts the classroom doors behind him as nonchalantly as possible and then he’s storming up to that devil-woman, sitting so calmly behind her desk at the very front of their classroom, scribbling away at Goddess knows what. She looks up. “Forget something?” 

“What did you want?” 

Her face so incessantly blank. “Beg pardon?” 

“This arrangement, what did you want?” 

Byleth looks at him. “Your academic progress, of course.” 

Felix burns his glare into her, unyielding. “What the hell did you want, putting us together?” 

Byleth doesn’t answer. The seconds stretch on, like time does not exist, never existed, and will, in fact, never exist, ever again. Felix does not waver where he stands at all and lets the question hang for that unending eternity. 

She smiles. “You’re keeping her waiting.”

Annette’s waiting for him with her hands clasped behind when he comes back out. “Find what you were looking for?”

“Of course I did.” 

“Great! Let’s get going.”


End file.
